


no kingdom to come

by lovelight (Delenaley)



Category: EXO (Band)
Genre: Flash Fic, Junmyeon's Birthday Week 2020, M/M, MerMay, Nonbinary Character, Sirens, Survivor Guilt, gratuitous mentions of teeth
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-30
Updated: 2020-05-30
Packaged: 2021-03-03 00:01:04
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 999
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24285508
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Delenaley/pseuds/lovelight
Summary: “They say if man can resist the lures, we die. I sang, you did not give in. But here I am, and there you are—both very much alive, human.”
Relationships: Byun Baekhyun/Kim Junmyeon | Suho
Comments: 4
Kudos: 29
Collections: Challenge #2 — Merfolk





	no kingdom to come

Junmyeon woke up gasping, desperate to release the remaining residue of water in his lungs. He got on all fours, coughing and coughing until every breath he took didn't feel so painful, his vision clearing.

Amidst his panic to breathe, he failed to notice his surroundings.

He's on a beach.

“Easy there, sailor. “

Junmyeon froze in his spot, fear clutching his chest. It was not a voice he recognized, he knows exactly how his crewmates’ voices sound, and none matches the grace the unfamiliar voice had just spoken with. He shuddered.

There can only be one possibility.

“You’re not like the others,” the other says softly, Junmyeon catches rows of sharp teeth under their lips, glinting under the sun. The lower half of their body still submerged in water.

Junmyeon finally remembers—remembers the ship heading for the rocks, the storm raging overhead, the chaos on board—his fellow crewmates shouting and begging, names of their sweethearts falling off their lips as they scramble off board and into the deep blue sea.

And the song, clear and resounding inside his chest. Above all, _inviting,_ like falling into the arms of a lover, being embraced at death’s door—but he’s seen the truth. He too, had leaped from their ship and into the water, descending into the deep and the dark. He’s seen the truth, and it will haunt him for as long as he lives—a small piece of memory from his brief moment of consciousness, wishing he was one of his friends, instead of having to watch them being torn apart flesh by flesh of sharp teeth, dying with the illusion that they’re finally back in the arms of their loved ones.

He wonders why he’s still breathing, or if he even deserved it at all.

“Where are my friends?” He asks hoarsely, throat sore from all the retching.

“Absolved.”

Junmyeon’s heart sank. He knew the answer already, flashes of knifelike teeth engraved in his memory—but the differences between him and the creature before him is that he is human, and if there’s one thing humans are good at; it’s holding on to hope.

“Why am I alive?”

He doesn’t deserve this. He has no sweetheart at home, no one waiting for him, not since his family condemned him to die at sea—and he _should,_ he should’ve died. But he didn’t, and in return, his friends with wives and children, girls waiting with rings on their fingers, they’re never coming home.

“You’re different,” the creature repeats, tilting their head. Junmyeon notices their hair is blue, a shade more vibrant than all the oceans he’s sailed. It reminded him of sapphires. Breathtaking.

“How?”

“You... resisted, didn’t give in,” they answered, tongue running over the top row of their teeth, every single one pointed and incisive. Perfect for tearing apart flesh. “They say if man can resist the lures, we die. I sang, you did not give in. But here I am, and there you are—both very much alive, human.”

“Are you going to kill me?” He swallows, the siren’s eyes follow the movement.

“No, you are safe here. No harm will come to you.”

—

The siren is called Baekhyun.

They don’t talk about the death of Junmyeon’s crew, or the reasoning behind his salvation. Junmyeon doesn’t ask.

Baekhyun brought him to a small, unoccupied island. Lush and filled with enough food to last Junmyeon a lifetime. They come on land often. Junmyeon still hasn’t seen their full underwater form, but ‘human’ Baekhyun proved to be a wonder itself. Glittering scales decorate the sides of their arms and patches of their legs, some parts of their skin would be tinted in faded hues of blue. It was the closest they could manage to resemble humans.

They keep him company on the island. Sometimes they’d bring shells, each one Junmyeon stores carefully in his makeshift hut, in a clearing inside the forest. He hasn’t seen a ship pass by in ages, but the company makes it hard to want to leave.

The first time Baekhyun kissed him, a stranger had arrived at the island. The man’s knife made it a hair’s breadth from Junmyeon’s throat before his siren showed up.

Baekhyun had ripped him apart starting by the neck, feasting on flesh and blood straight from the heart. Junmyeon couldn’t bring himself to look away.

When Baekhyun stands up, their lips is smeared in crimson, their teeth stained by the blood. When they pressed their lips to Junmyeon’s, it tasted metallic.

Junmyeon kissed back.

(How can he leave when his heart is rooted in this very island?

Home has been replaced by hands, wrapped around his waist; by the gentle drag of incisors on his shoulders. It’s clear laughter, accompanied by the sound of waves hitting the sand, that makes Junmyeon hope he never leaves.

His crewmates are not coming home. But Junmyeon is)

—

There’s this painting Junmyeon’s uncle gave as a gift to him when he was a child.

His father had laughed, asking how a child would appreciate a painting, his mother called it lovely and hung it on the wall of his bedroom. His uncle had been a sailor, and ever since he came home, he had become a shadow of the man he used to be, a vessel with a sense of longing eternally etched into his being.

Junmyeon never quite fully understood. The painting had been a depiction of the sea during a storm, strikes of lightning decorated the skies, the water underneath waging war on the ship. Little Junmyeon had questioned why his mother would consider such a thing to be lovely when he only stared at it once and thought of how terrifying it was.

Recalling on the painting now, with his fingers tangled in the sapphire strands of Baekhyun’s hair, laying down on the grass and bathed in sunlight, the siren grinning up at him with rows of sharp teeth—he wonders, why can’t it be both lovely and terrifying?

**Author's Note:**

> [screams on top of a hill] NONBINARY MERFOLK RIGHTS!!
> 
> anyways this is my contribution for junnie's bday!! i saw that the theme for the 2nd challenge was merfolk and i couldn't help myself 😍 thank you mods for hosting this!! this is a bit messy but i hope it came out well. title taken from hozier's no plan. 💙


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